kerberos
 

I am so happy to have gotten samba working at last the way i want it. Now i want to move on to Kerberize it to make it more secure.

A big issue is whether Windows XP SP2 Home Edition supports Kerberos? Has anyone tried it yet? If it doesn't support it, then I can't use Kerberos because the main point is to allow access from my Windows XP machines.

I have not tryed it. But I belive it does. but Home edition will not be able to be a part of your samba domain.
So you will have to authenticate every single time you access a network ressource.
It wont be as transparent as went your machines are a part of a domain.